


Your Turn

by f-ing-ruthless-baz (f_ing_ruthless_baz)



Series: The Sleepover [2]
Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Magical, Awkwardness, Dogs, Fluff, M/M, POV Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch, Second Kiss, Sharing a Bed, Sleepovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-14
Updated: 2020-05-14
Packaged: 2021-03-03 05:15:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,347
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24179557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/f_ing_ruthless_baz/pseuds/f-ing-ruthless-baz
Summary: When my stepmother dropped me off at Simon’s house on Saturday, my nerves started to flare up again. I'd felt like this every time I’d seen Simon since our last sleepover, three weeks ago. Since he kissed me.He hadn’t kissed me since then.Simon invites Baz over for a sleepover, but Baz isn't sure what to make of it. Are they just friends, or is there something more going on?
Relationships: Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch/Simon Snow
Series: The Sleepover [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1745137
Comments: 12
Kudos: 210





	Your Turn

**Author's Note:**

> I finally bring you the long-awaited sequel to _The Sleepover_. (Jk, I don't think anyone was waiting for this.)
> 
> Fun fact, I actually started writing this fairly shortly after the first one, even though it was just supposed to be a one-shot, originally. But then I got stuck, shoved it aside for a few months, pulled it out and wrote a bit more, got stuck, shoved it aside for a few months, over and over, until recently I pulled it out again only to see that it was basically complete. I think I'd just been too nervous to share it earlier because I figured no one would want to read it. But I have confirmation on Tumblr that some people would, so that's good enough to me!
> 
> Many thanks to the Circle of Tears, thehoneyedhufflepuff and warriorbeeofthesea, for being my lovely betas, and to giishu for letting me whine about this fic off and on for over a year, probably.
> 
> Texts:  
>  _Simon_  
>  _ **Baz**_

_i asked my mum and she said u can sleepover tomorrow night_

**_Hm. Fascinating_.**

_will u??_

**_Will I what?_ **

_sleepover?  
_ _plz? :P_

**_Possibly…  
_ ** **_If you want me to._ **

_yyyyes  
_ _bring blueberry_

**_Overnight?_ **

_she can sleep in my bed :D_

**_Then where would you sleep?_ **

_also in my bed  
_ _puPPY SNUGGLES_

**_Hah. Best of luck to you_.**

_why would u say that?_

**_No reason.  
_ ** **_*distant cackling*_ **

_EVIL  
_ _ur uninvited now  
_ _wait no  
_ _u can still come_

**_Thank you._ **

_i will steal ur dog while u sleep ;)_

**_Bold of you to assume I sleep at all._ **

_ive seen u sleep_

**_Stalker._ **

_baz u invited me into ur bed_

**_You invited yourself, technically.  
_ ** **_I only invited you to stay over._ **

_potato potato_

**_That... doesn’t work in text._ **

_if u come over i promise not to steal ur dog  
_ _ok?_

**_I’ll think about it._ **

_BAZ_

* * *

When my stepmother dropped me off at Simon’s house on Saturday, my nerves started to flare up again. I’d felt like this every time I’d seen Simon since our last sleepover, three weeks ago. Since he kissed me.

He hadn’t kissed me since then.

I didn’t know what that meant. I didn’t know what any of it meant.

We’d been friendlier with each other at school lately, although just barely. And he had come along on walks with me—and Blueberry, of course—a few times after school and on weekends. And we texted each other. A lot.

Based on our interactions since getting back to school the Monday after, I’d say we were friends—perhaps even well on our way to becoming _good_ friends. It was just that pesky Sunday kiss putting a wrench in the works, throwing me off-kilter when I tried to figure out what we were, exactly.

None of my friends had ever kissed me before. Well, _no one_ had ever kissed me before, but my friends had certainly never kissed me, even more so. (Not that I had a ton of friends to speak of.)

I collected my overnight bag from the boot and swung it onto my shoulder before helping Blueberry out of the car—she wasn’t overly fond of car rides, so we didn’t take her out in it very often. She must have been quite eager to set her paws on stable ground, I’d imagine.

“I’ll pick you up at eleven tomorrow,” my stepmother said when she rolled down the car window. “But call if you need to get picked up sooner, all right?”

“I’ll be fine,” I said, standing tensely on the pavement near Simon’s house. “I’m not a child.”

“I know that, love. You just seem a bit nervous, so I want you to know I can come get you any time you need.”

“Thank you. I’ll be all right, though.”

I adjusted my bag on my shoulder—it was quite heavy with all the things both Blueberry and I would need for the night—and tightened my grip on Blueberry’s leash when she started to pull in the direction of one of the houses. As if she instinctively knew where we were going and who was going to be there. (Well, I’d been telling her since yesterday that we were going to see the cute boy, but I doubted she’d known what that meant. Perhaps I was wrong.)

I’d only just said my goodbyes and saw my stepmother off with a small wave, when Blueberry barked eagerly and startled me. She so rarely did that; it was a bit alarming.

I turned around, expecting to see a postman down the road, or something of the sort, only to find Simon grinning as he approached us from a terraced house a couple doors over. He couldn’t seem to make up his mind about which of us to look at, so his eyes darted back and forth between the two of us. Made me wonder which one of us he was more excited to see, me or Blueberry.

“Hey,” he said when he got within speaking range of me—because I, for some reason, didn’t think to start walking towards him yet—and I thought for sure he was going to stoop and hug Blueberry before acknowledging me any further. But he didn’t.

“Uh… Hey,” I replied, confused when he reached out to take the bag from my shoulder. I angled my shoulder back so he couldn’t. “I’ve got it.”

“But that looks heavy.”

“It’s fine.”

“ _Baz_. You’re my guest,” he said. “Let me help.”

“I’m not just a guest, I’m your—” I hesitated for a split second because I didn’t know how to end that sentence. “—Friend.”

He momentarily frowned, and I worried that I’d said the absolute wrong thing—too much or too little, I wasn’t sure—but then he smiled again as he lifted the bag off my shoulder. “All the more reason.”

I gave in and let him take it before we headed towards his front door, although I was still nervous. ”Does your mum know that we—er, that I… That I’m…”

“That you’re what?”

“Just… What did you tell her about me?” I asked.

“I dunno, regular stuff,” he said with a small laugh. “Y’know, that you’re a hardcore drug user and you steal shit—to fund your drug habit, of course—and you’re trying to get me to join your gang. Normal things like that.”

He seemed pretty pleased with his joke, and I chuckled half-heartedly. “Right. Good.”

“She knows that you’re my… friend, okay?”

“All right…” I didn’t really know what the pause before _friend_ meant this time. Was he merely copying what I’d said? Or was he also unsure of what we were to each other?

Was that a good thing or a bad thing?

* * *

Simon’s mother was unsurprisingly friendly and welcoming to me when I arrived—it was clear where Simon got his warmth. At least personality-wise. Temperature-wise, I couldn’t say.

Blueberry seemed rather fond of her, anyway, and followed her around the house for most of the evening, sitting near her feet as we all watched more episodes of _The_ _Umbrella Academy_. (Simon and his mum had already watched the whole series since he’d been over at my house, so I was the only one who didn’t already know what was coming.)

I found it a bit odd at first that he could watch something like this with his mum—my father and stepmother certainly wouldn’t have had an interest—but it seemed less odd once I realized that they were more like _friends_ than I could ever be with my parents. Even when she offered to get out of our hair, Simon insisted it wasn’t a problem for her to stay and watch with us. And it wasn’t a problem. Not really.

I was slightly nervous for a bit, though, when Klaus was talking about Dave. As if I thought that some look on my face would give me away. Or that Simon would look at me knowingly—even as a show of support—and tip off his mum that I find queer characters _very_ relatable. (Unless Simon had been serious about telling her I was a drug addict, because then I would have had a different reason to relate to Klaus.)

There was no issue, of course. Nobody batted an eye. I was making a much bigger deal of this whole thing than I ought to have, evidently.

Simon and I stayed in the living room to watch another episode after his mum headed upstairs for the night, however, and I actually felt more nervous than I had before. It was the first time he and I were alone together since we slept in my bed. _Alone_ alone, I mean. Not at school, or in the park—though we hadn’t been back to that secluded thicket of trees, either.

I thought maybe we would finally talk about it now.

“Well, I’m about ready to call it a night,” he said, rolling his shoulders. He scratched the top of Blueberry’s head, who was lying on the sofa between us—he spoiled her here, where there wasn’t a ‘no dogs on the furniture’ rule.

“Right, yeah, me too,” I replied, even though I wasn’t all that tired yet. I was used to staying up quite late on weekends, but I wasn’t about to argue.

Simon rose from his seat and picked up my bag off the floor, as Blueberry and I obediently followed him up the stairs to his bedroom.

“I promise I did tidy it before you got here,” he said when he led us inside, keeping his voice low so as not to disturb his mum. “But it’s kinda small, so there’s not really anywhere to put stuff.”

I stood off to one side next to a little desk as Simon closed the door, and I looked around. It seemed a third of the size of my room, and that was a generous estimate. There was hardly any space between the desk chair and the foot of the bed, which was pushed up against one wall, and a dresser on the opposite wall. There was just enough room between the single bed and the dresser for the sleeping bag that had been rolled out there already.

“I’ll take the floor, don’t worry,” he said when he noticed me eyeing the sleeping arrangements.

“Oh, no, it’s fine—”

“You’re my guest—and my _friend_ —so you should get the bed.” He elbowed me in the side on the word friend, and I wasn’t sure how to take that, so I just chuckled lightly. “Besides, Blueberry likes sleeping on the floor, yeah?”

I looked down at the sleeping bag again, where Blueberry appeared to have made herself comfortable, stretched out diagonally across the whole thing, which she had bunched up beneath her for more cushioning.

“Yeah, she does,” I said.

“Aww…” Simon crouched down to her level and smoothed his hand down her back. “You’re not gonna make room for me down here, are you, Blueberry? I can’t even be mad at you, you’re too cute.”

He continued to fuss over her for a couple minutes as I stayed standing by the desk, contemplating our options. I could have made Blueberry move; I had a blanket for her rolled up in my bag, and she would have fit between the foot of the bed and the desk. But if I let her keep the sleeping bag…

That was probably a bad idea, though. It was one thing to share my king-size bed with Simon, where we were able to maintain a respectable distance from each other in our sleep. But his bed was barely half the size of mine. I couldn’t envision any arrangement where we wouldn’t end up touching in some way, unless we slept head to foot. And I didn’t really want to get kicked in the face, either.

Maybe this whole thing was a bloody terrible idea…

“Oh, by the way,” he said, looking up at me from where he was still kneeling next to the dog, “if you want to change or something, the bathroom’s just at the end of the hall.”

“Um, right. Yeah. Thanks,” I said awkwardly before grabbing my overnight bag from where he’d left it on the desk chair and heading out.

After I’d brushed my teeth and changed, I took his t-shirt out of my bag—the t-shirt he’d left behind when he slept over at my house, which I’d washed since then, of course—so I could return it to him. (I thought it might have been weird to bring it to school.)

When I got back to Simon’s room, it was a bit of a surprise to find that he was no longer on the floor near Blueberry, but sitting on his bed, leaning back against the headboard and scrolling on his phone. She seemed fast asleep anyway. Probably wasn’t very entertaining anymore.

He stopped scrolling when I shut the door behind me, and looked up with a small smile. Even in the dim light from the floor lamp by his bed, he was unjustifiably and overwhelmingly adorable, sitting there like that in his trackie bottoms, ankles crossed, looking like he’d been waiting for me. _Jesus_.

“Nice jammies,” he said, laughing, when he glanced down at the flannel bottoms I was wearing.

They were covered in Daleks—a joke gift from my aunt Fiona, because I went through a major _Doctor Who_ phase as a kid. I brought them to wear because I thought Simon might find them funny, but I was already regretting it. (It was rather unsettling to have my crush start laughing while looking at my lower half, to say the least.)

“Heh, thanks,” I said, trying to act like I was cool about this whole thing. I was cool about none of it, though. Zero chill.

I looked away shyly, down at the folded t-shirt in my hand, before looking back at him. “Oh, er, I have your—” I began, but I stopped when I noticed that, in addition to grey joggers, he was wearing a fitted black v-neck t-shirt. “Is that my shirt?”

A look of guilt washed over his face and he glanced down at his chest. “Shit, sorry,” he said. “I just—It’s so soft, I like sleeping in it.”

_Simon Snow likes sleeping in my t-shirt._ The thought made my ears warm.

“Here,” he added, sitting up and reaching behind his neck to start pulling the shirt up. “We can trade back—”

“No, it’s fine,” I said quickly. “I don’t mind. I—Hold on.”

I turned to face the closed door and pulled off the shirt I was wearing so I could replace it with the one in my hand. Which was probably a terrible idea, I realized, once my back was exposed to him. (Maybe I should have told him to close his eyes.) (Or would that have been even weirder?)

I chuckled nervously when I faced him again, his blue striped crew-neck t-shirt hanging slightly oversized on me. “Now we’re even?”

The stunned look on his face made me regret everything, but then he broke into a grin. “Yeah,” he said, and I exhaled in relief.

He watched me another moment, but I had to avert my gaze or I felt I might burst into flames. I looked down at Blueberry, who had settled herself on top of the sleeping bag quite comfortably.

“Well, I guess I should try to reclaim my sleeping bag, huh?” Simon added, swiftly turning his attention away as soon as our eyes met again. He set his phone on the deep windowsill next to him, which he seemed to use as a nightstand, and swung his legs over the side of the bed.

“I don’t think she’s going to move,” I said quickly, before I could stop myself. “Er, I mean—She kind of gets grumpy when you disturb her while she’s sleeping, so…”

“So…” He looked over his shoulder at the bed and then gave me a shrug. “I’m cool with sharing again, then.”

“Yeah, me too,” I said, though my voice probably betrayed the fact that I was sort of lying.

“Same sides as last time?” he said as he scooted himself back towards the wall to make room.

I nodded, but hesitated a moment before heading over.

He took the pair of pillows stacked at the head of the bed and placed them side by side, squishing them up together to fit, though mine was hanging over the edge a little.

“Plus this way you don’t have to climb over me if you need to get up in the night,” he said.

“What if you need to get up, though?” I asked, getting under the covers next to him while trying to avoid any sort of contact.

Lying back on his pillow, he turned to face me and grinned. “I’ll just have to climb over you, I guess.”

I let out a nervous laugh and hoped he couldn’t tell that my heart rate just sped up. It didn’t help that I couldn’t stop thinking about the fact that he was _wearing my t-shirt_ —and I was wearing his. It seemed oddly intimate, for some reason.

_Some people wear their boyfriend’s shirt_ , I thought to myself, which just made my head spin, trying to figure out what we were to each other, exactly.

“Baz,” he said, snapping me out of my spiralling thoughts as he turned onto his side completely, facing me. “Can I ask you something?”

I pressed my lips together and nodded again while staring straight up at the ceiling.

“This is, uh—This is going to sound weird, because you’re in my bed and everything, and I don’t want you to get the wrong idea…” he began, and I finally looked over at him, worried by what he might want to ask. “But do you think you’re ever going to kiss me?”

The dim lamp beside me was casting shadows on Simon’s face, making it difficult to read, so I couldn’t tell if he was pulling my leg or not.

“I don’t mean _now_ , of course,” he added quickly, but he gave me a playful bro-punch on the shoulder that didn’t clarify anything for me. “Just, like, I can’t tell if it’s something you want to do.”

This felt like a trick question, so I looked up at the ceiling again without a word. I didn’t want to say the wrong thing, so I just said nothing.

“I thought, um, that maybe…” he said rolling onto his back again. “Well, I thought you liked that I kissed you in the park the other day.”

“I… Yeah,” was all I could manage to say.

“But you didn’t want to do it again?” He glanced back at me, looking heartbreakingly disappointed. I had to look away.

“Of course I did, but you didn’t even try to—”

“It was your turn, Baz!” he said, his voice still low, but sharp.

I frowned at him. “What do you mean, _my_ turn?”

“I started the first one, so yeah, it was your turn.”

“Well, how was I supposed to know that?” I hissed. “I figured if you really wanted to kiss me again, you would have by now.”

“I didn’t want to seem, like, needy or whatever. Plus, you never said that we—I mean, I wasn’t sure what we… were. _Are_. I dunno, maybe we aren’t even anything—”

“We are,” I said quickly. “We’re… something. I _want_ us to be something. I just, I didn’t know if you wanted to—”

He nudged me with his elbow again. “I want to.”

“Okay, then…” I looked towards my hands, fidgeting with the blanket over my chest, unsure where to go from here.

“So…” he said, pausing afterwards like he was waiting for me to say something. But I didn’t. “Are you gonna tell anyone?”

“Tell anyone what?”

“About us, I mean.”

“I don’t… know,” I said hesitantly. I hadn’t really considered that I’d need to tell people about us, since I hadn’t been sure there was any _us_ to tell about.

“Well, I know you’re kind of a private person and all,” he said, “but I’d like to tell my mum, if that’s okay.”

I cast him a sideways glance. “Right now?”

“No.” He laughed a little. “Just, at some point. When you’re okay with it.”

“Right, yeah,” I said, looking back down at my hands again. “Do you think she’ll be… supportive of this?”

He rolled his head toward me, and I turned my head to face him as well, our foreheads nearly touching. “Of course she will. She likes you.”

“Does she?”

“Yeah,” he said with a smile. “She told me, when you left to get a glass of water from the kitchen. Said you seemed like a really thoughtful young man.”

“Did she really say that?”

“Yeah, it was weird.” He turned onto his side again and brushed some of my hair down into my face, eliciting a quiet chuckle from me.

I swept my hair back and contemplated it—kissing him. All this time, I didn’t know I was allowed. I didn’t know he wanted me to. I didn’t know he’d let me…

I tilted my chin up and kissed him gently on the forehead. I didn’t think I could kiss him properly yet, not like this. In his bed. In my Dalek _jammies_ , as he called them. But I did want him to know. I was gonna kiss him. Eventually.

He was smiling when I drew my head back. “Just so you know, that doesn’t count as your turn.”

* * *

I learned that Simon could cook. Well, he could make pancakes, which was more than I could do. Fluffy American style pancakes, with maple syrup his mum’s friend brought from Canada. They were good.

It took a bit of convincing for him to get me to come down and eat in my pyjamas, but he insisted this was what _normal_ people did.

_“It’s Sunday,”_ he’d said. _“Most people don’t get dressed at all on Sundays.”_

_“Most people are slobs,”_ I replied.

_“So?”_

I didn’t particularly want his mum to see my Dalek _jammies_ , though. Nor did I want her to see that I’d slept in her son’s t-shirt. (He slept in mine first, to be fair.) But I couldn’t exactly tell Simon that these were my concerns, so I had no way of arguing against him. Which was how I ended up sitting at his kitchen table in my pyjamas, eating pancakes.

His mum didn’t say anything about the Daleks or the t-shirt, thankfully.

I changed shortly after breakfast, however, but Simon stayed in his trackies for the rest of the morning—not that I was complaining. (Though he did look annoyingly huggable like that, and it made me wish I was the kind of person who could just do that. Hug someone because I wanted to.)

Simon offered to walk us out—Blueberry and me—when my stepmother was supposed to pick us up, but I hovered in the entryway after putting on my shoes. I didn’t want to go. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye.

I wasn’t ready to go back to the way things had been the past few weeks.

Maybe they wouldn’t, after our conversation last night, but I still felt like nothing was really settled. _I want us to be something_ , I’d said. But what did _something_ mean?

“Simon…” I said as he was reaching down to stroke Blueberry’s head. I was practically whispering, even though his mum was in the kitchen, around the corner at the far end of the house, and probably couldn’t hear us.

He straightened and turned his attention back to me. “Yeah?”

“I was—Er, do you—” I began, twisting Blueberry’s lead around my hand anxiously. I took a deep breath to steel myself. “Do you want to be my boyfriend?”

His eyes seemed confused for a moment, but then he smiled. “Aren’t I?”

“I—I wasn’t sure that—”

“Baz,” he said, and took my hand—the one that wasn’t wrapped up. “I want to be your boyfriend. If you want to be mine.”

I couldn’t keep the stupid grin of relief off my face. “Yeah,” I said with a nervous laugh. “Yeah, I—”

He squeezed my hand and I squeezed his back. “Good.”

We stood, frozen by the door, waiting. Waiting for me. _It’s my turn_ , I thought.

“Simon, can I—” I said, taking a step closer to him. “I mean, is it okay if I—”

He nodded slightly, his eyes fixed on me. “Yeah.”

My breath was shaking as I leaned in to kiss him, though at least this time I had a better idea of what to expect. I was still no expert at this sort of thing—Simon had clearly had more practice than me—but at least it wasn’t a shock.

I almost forgot that we couldn’t do this forever. That we’d have to be careful not to get caught. At least for now.

But Blueberry started tugging on her lead, and my arm jerked, bumping Simon in the stomach and knocking us back into reality with a laugh.

“I should…” I said, giving his hand another squeeze. “My ride’s probably here, so…”

“Yeah…”

We stopped again outside so he could say a proper goodbye to Blueberry—which involved crouching to the ground and throwing his arms around her as he told her repeatedly how much he loved her and was going to miss her.

“Maybe we could all, um… hang out next weekend,” I suggested as he stood to face me again. “If, you know, you wanted to.”

He smiled broadly. “I’d like that.”

For a second, I almost thought he was about to lean in and kiss me again, but then he opened his arms and pulled me in for a hug. It was a short hug—nothing suspiciously lingering about it—but my heart nearly leapt out of my chest. (Simon was the kind of person who could hug someone just because he wanted to.)

He grinned again as he took a step back and said he’d see me at school tomorrow, before I headed to my stepmother’s car.

“Did you have a good time?” she asked, once Blueberry and I were settled in.

“Yes, I… It was good,” I said awkwardly.

“Good.” She smiled but kept her eyes on the road. “It’s nice to see you making a new friend, Basil. I can tell you like spending time with Simon, so I’m glad.”

“He’s… He’s fun to hang out with, I guess.”

“And you know he’s welcome to come over any time, right?”

“Good.” I nodded, looking down at my knees, and she reached over to squeeze my arm briefly.

“We just want you to be happy, I hope you know that.”

I swallowed. “Yeah.”

We continued the rest of the way home in silence, but I texted Simon to let him know he could tell his mum about us.

And maybe one day soon I would tell mine.

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to know about my WIPs and other random, vaguely Carry On or fanfic-related things I like to talk about, you can find me on tumblr as [@f-ing-ruthless-baz](https://f-ing-ruthless-baz.tumblr.com)!


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